In October 2013 Snapchat updated its app to include Stories which allowed users to build a sequence of content that could be viewed an unlimited number of times over a 24-hour period. Then in 2016 Snapchat updated this feature to include Snapchat Stories auto-advance allowing users to move to the next story after one story has played. Snapchat Stories became a big hit with its younger audience and quickly took hold with millennials.

It wasn’t long before other platforms realized the potential of Snapchat’s feature and in August 2016 Instagram launched Instagram Stories. The product piggybacked on the success of Shapchat Stories and works just like it. One difference is that Instagram has double the user reach over Snapchat – Instagram Stories feature is currently used by 200 million of their 700 million users.

According to Google Trends, Instagram Stories is two times more popular than Snapchat Stories. Couple this with the fact that Instagram users easily go through the new feature while staying on a familiar platform and you have yourself the winner of this competition. With such a greater reach to a wider audience, Instagram Stories is attracting users away from Snapchat and even is attributed to stalling Snapchat’s growth.

Instagram or Snapchat: Who do Social Influencers Favor?

With growing competition for the same feature on the two different platforms, it prompted a month-long study by Mediakix that examined to which platform’s Stories feature top influencers posted most often. The evaluation included 12 top social influencers who had from 495K to 16.6 M followers, regularly post on Snapchat, and are looking for the most engagement opportunities.

The study findings showed:

Instagram Stories was favored over Snapchat stories 25 of the 30 days

On average, social influencers posted on Instagram 25% more of the time than Snapchat.

Instagram had an average 6.6 stories posted per day over Snapchat’s 5.3

8 out of 12 social influencers posted more on Instagram Stories than Snapchat Stories

Social Influencer Marketing Impact

The Instagram vs. Snapchat study is but a small example of the greater picture for the rapidly growing social influencer marketing industry. Instagram’s influence marketing, currently a 1 billion dollar industry, shows it could reach 2 billion by 2019. Clearly social media influencer marketing has become one of the most important ways to increase awareness of your property and brand. With its leap ahead of Snapchat, Instagram learned there is power in the opinion of peers. They are clearly onto something!